Colleen Susan Peterson (November 14, 1950 – October 9, 1996) was a Canadiancountry andfolk singer, who performed both as a solo artist and as a member of the bandQuartette.^[1][2]

Peterson began performing in coffeehouses in Ottawa in 1966.^[3] She won anRPM Gold Leaf Award for Most Promising Female Vocalist in 1967 and, in 1968, joinedBruce Cockburn,David Wiffen, Richard Patterson and Dennis Pendrith in a later version of the folk band3's a Crowd.^[4] She then joined the bandTCB that recorded an album on theTraffic label. She left after that. In 1970, she was cast in the Canadian production ofHair.

She subsequently moved toKingston in 1971, forming the band Spriggs and Bringle with Mark Haines. She then relocated toNashville in 1974,^[5][4] and released her first solo album,Beginning to Feel Like Home, in 1976.^[6] She had a hit single on theBillboard country charts with "Souvenirs", and won aJuno Award for Most Promising Female Vocalist in 1977.^[7]

Following her 1978 albumTaking My Boots Off, Peterson did not record new material for several years, although she appeared on two albums by theCharlie Daniels Band in 1980 and 1981. She continued to perform, however, touring withGordon Lightfoot,Tom Waits andRy Cooder, hosting television specials and appearing onSpirit of the Country andThe Tommy Hunter Show, and working as a backing vocalist forWaylon Jennings,Roger Miller,Janie Fricke andMarty Stuart. Artists such asAnne Murray,Ronnie Prophet andSylvia Tyson also recorded Peterson's songs.

In 1986 Peterson released the single "I Had It All", which was a hit on the Canadian country charts and launched the most successful phase of her career. She released the albumBasic Facts, her first in ten years, in 1988, and had a string of ten hits, including "No Pain, No Gain", which hit No. 1 on the Canadian country charts in 1991.

In 1993, she joined Tyson,Caitlin Hanford andCindy Church for a one-off concert at Toronto'sHarbourfront, and the four later also appeared together onCBC Radio'sMorningside and onA Prairie Home Companion in the United States. Due to favourable audience response to the collaboration, they continued to work together, adopting the nameQuartette^[8][9] and releasing their first album in 1994.^[10]

Peterson toured and recorded with Quartette until 1996, when she was diagnosed with cancer. Unable to perform with the band during her cancer treatment, she chose her friend and collaboratorGwen Swick to fill in for her, and died in Toronto on October 9 of that year. She is buried inLittle Lake Cemetery in Peterborough, Ontario.

Peterson was inducted into the Ottawa Valley Country Music Hall of Fame in 1995.^[11] Additionally, she was posthumously inducted into theCanadian Country Music Hall of Fame in 2000.^[12][13] In 2003, theColleen Peterson Songwriting Award, an award for young emerging songwriters, was created in her memory.^[14] In 2004, her friend and songwriting partnerNancy Simmonds worked with several musicians to produce a new album,Postcards from California, from unreleased demos she had recorded with Peterson in the early 1990s.

• Colleen Peterson discography atDiscogs
• Colleen Peterson atIMDb

• 1950 births
• 1996 deaths
• Canadian women country singers
• Juno Award for Breakthrough Artist of the Year winners
• Musicians from Peterborough, Ontario
• Singers from Ontario
• Deaths from cancer in Ontario
• Quartette (band) members
• 20th-century Canadian women singers

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